HLS is Europe's largest contract animal-testing company, testing everything from pesticides to drugs, on behalf of commercial clients, on around 75,000 animals a year, including rats, rabbits, pigs, dogs, and primates.
[7][8] HLS was the subject of an undercover investigation by the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection in 1989, which alleged that workers routinely mishandled the animals.
[9] Nicholson, Avery, and Dellemagne set up SHAC in November 1999, after People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals obtained undercover footage showed HLS staff punching and shaking beagles in the company's laboratory in Cambridge, England.
This could entail protesters standing outside homes, blowing whistles and letting off fireworks throughout the night, spraying graffiti on property, breaking windows, spreading rumours to neighbours that the target was a paedophile, and sending hoax bombs and obscene mail.
[17] In January 2009, after pleading not guilty at Winchester Crown Court, Nicholson was jailed for 11 years for conspiracy to blackmail during the SHAC campaign.
Police obtained evidence to secure the conviction by bugging a 2007 meeting in a cottage in Moorcote, near Hook, Hampshire, attended by Nicholson and six other SHAC activists, as well as hired cars they had used.
[18] The court heard that Nicholson was among seven people who had made false paedophile accusations, caused criminal damage and used bomb hoaxes to intimidate companies associated with HLS.